\n<\/p>\n
Former US Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick hit a superb, bogey-free 63 to claim a one-shot lead over Viktor Hovland after a punishing second round at the RBC Heritage in South Carolina.<\/p>\n
On a day of sweltering heat and unpredictable wind, the Englishman moved to 14 under par with an impeccable round helped by a stroke of fortune at the par-three 14th.<\/p>\n
After pulling his tee shot towards the trees, Fitzpatrick’s ball struck a cart path, ricocheted back on to the green, and was only prevented from trickling into the water by a well-positioned sprinkler head.<\/p>\n
He capitalised fully, holing the subsequent 30-foot putt for an improbable birdie.<\/p>\n
“Yeah, it was lucky, there’s no two ways about it,” Fitzpatrick said. “Sometimes you need that in a week, so it’s nice to get, and then even nicer to take advantage of it.”<\/p>\n
The 2023 champion followed up with two further birdies in his final three holes to surge ahead of the field.<\/p>\n
Norway’s Hovland remains his closest challenger after a stunning birdie at the 17th kept him in the hunt.<\/p>\n
“I wouldn’t say I striped it today, but at least I kind of kept the ball in front of me, and that’s what you’re trying to do on this golf course,” Hovland said.<\/p>\n
World number one Scottie Scheffler, playing alongside Fitzpatrick, produced a characteristically disciplined 67. Despite hitting every fairway, the American struggled to convert several birdie opportunities and sits seven shots adrift.<\/p>\n
Jordan Spieth was among those to suffer in the tricky conditions, carding three double bogeys in a frustrating 72, while Akshay Bhatia hit 11 birdies in a round of 63 to climb back to -6.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Former US Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick hit a superb, bogey-free 63 to claim a one-shot lead over Viktor Hovland after a punishing second round at the RBC Heritage in South Carolina. On a day of sweltering heat and unpredictable wind, the Englishman moved to 14 under par with an impeccable round helped by a stroke<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13268,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-golf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}